Build the Bundle Around Tire and Wheel
A protection bundle packages several products into one, usually three to five depending on the store: tire and wheel, key replacement, windshield, paintless dent repair, and so on. Every dealership can build it differently, and they should.
But every good bundle has one thing in common.
Tire and wheel is the anchor
Tire and wheel sells the bundle. If it isn't in yours, fix that first. Everything else rides along behind it.
It's the product customers relate to fastest, and in some markets it isn't close. In the Northeast, tire and wheel claims run significantly higher than in milder markets. Winter, salt, and potholes see to that.
In Ohio we like to say there are two seasons: winter and construction. Right after winter, the roads look like a war zone. Your front tire hits a pothole, and since misery loves company, your rear tire hits it a second later. Now you're on the shoulder with two bad tires. And that never happens on the way to the airport for vacation. It happens the week your checking account is already running on fumes.
Every customer in a cold-weather market has that story. Half of them have it twice. They don't have to imagine it. They've lived it.
The value is real
Bought separately, the products in a bundle cost the customer a lot more than the bundle does. That's the pitch in one sentence: more protection for less money than they'd pay piece by piece. You don't have to dress it up.
Build it for the market
There's no single right bundle. A store surrounded by rough roads should lean hard on tire and wheel. A store in a hail corridor should be thinking about dent repair. The products, the order they're presented in, and the price should fit the customers that store actually sees, not the customers some vendor's template assumed.
We help dealerships build whatever bundle makes sense for their market. We have strong opinions about what works. But the right answer depends on the store, and anyone who tells you otherwise is selling you their bundle, not yours.
Track it
Two numbers tell you whether the bundle is working: PVR (profit per vehicle retailed) and penetration (the share of deals that include it). If penetration is low, the product usually isn't the problem. The presentation is, or the pay plan is. Fix those before you go shopping for a new product.